This book integrates the three most powerful emerging concepts in service operations over the last decade: Lean Thinking, Design Thinking, and Systems Thinking. Together, these three will form the basis for service and administration operations for the future. It is the second edition of the best selling "Lean Toolbox for Service Systems" published in 2007.
This edition is a significant revision and extension. Since 2007 there have been numerous developments in Lean Service particularly in health care, local and central government, and in offi ce and administration operations. Whilst the advantages of Lean Thinking have increasingly been recognised, so too have both the usefulness and the limitations of Lean manufacturing concepts when applied in service settings. "Systems" concepts, some of then dating back several decades, have been rediscovered and reworked. Design Thinking has also emerged from several successful companies to join the service management agenda.
The concepts and the most useful tools from the three areas are included in the book. It draws on established theory as well as case studies, research, and consulting work carried out by the author together with associates and graduate executive students at Lean Enterprise Research Centre, Cardiff Business School and at The University of Buckingham. All the concepts and tools have been thoroughly discussed, tested, reworked, modified, and applied in settings ranging across all four types of service.
